Harry Potter and the Forest Of Shadows
by kittly-kat
Summary: The final chapter the Harry's Hogwarts years. With his death Dumbledore has left a series of objects with Harry, which may be clues to unlock how to defeat Voldemort. Join Harry as he finds out how to Destroy the Dark Lord, for good.
1. Last Wishes

Harry couldn't take it anymore. He kept running through more and more dark corridors, ending up nowhere. Just running in circles over and over again, or maybe not circles. Maybe this was just one giant maze that never ended. He knew he had to get to something important, but he wasn't exactly sure what. He heard the distant screech of a dragon.

'I'll be sure and steer clear of there.' He thought to himself, turning down a hallway going the opposite direction from where he heard the screech.

All he could see was black, but there was always a white light in the distance, and when it felt like he had finally reached it, it just turned into another endless corridor. He didn't want to be lost in this maze forever, so he ran faster, and faster. His heart pounded against his chest and he felt like he was going to faint, but he had to go on. Something was at the end of this, and he needed to get to it. The white light he'd been chasing this whole time kept getting brighter, and brighter.

A voice beckons Harry, echoing around the walls of the dark hall. "Harry, come on, Harry." He gets closer to the light, almost able to touch it. A silhouette of a man stands in the white light. He's almost there, almost.

"Harry, get up!" Hermione's voice startles him. He jerks awake and looks around. He's in the Hogwart's dorm room and two blurry figures are on either side of him. He grabs his glasses from his nightstand and Hermione and Ron become clear. "Honest, we've been trying to wake you for about half an hour now! Are you coming to breakfast or not?" Harry looks at his watch, and sees it's only seven-thirty.

"Why do I need to go this early? Classes don't start for another three hours." He stubbornly grabs his pillow and pulls it over his head. He hears Hermione growl in frustration and feels her eyes burrowing into him. "And stop giving me a Hermione glare! I'm tired. I'll be down when I want to."

"Harry we need to talk to you about something, too!" Hermione says impatiently. He feels someone shove him a bit, and then Ron finally speaks up.

"You'd better listen to her, mate. She's in one of her moods." Harry slides out from under the pillow and looks up at them both.

"Alright, already! Hermione, out! I need to change." Hermione rolls her eyes and pulls the covers off of Harry. He's wearing a pair of boxers and a wife beater.

"It's not like I haven't seen you like this before. Just throw on a pair of pants, a shirt, and your robes and lets go!" Harry obeys her and they all head down to breakfast. Harry snickers some along the way as Ron and Hermione hold hands and kiss every now and then, still trying to get used to them being a couple.

They all sit around the Gryffindor table; a bowl of cereal immediately appears in front of Harry, who starts munching away. Hermione and Ron sit next to each other and exchange lovey-dovey glances, causing Harry to snicker some more and have milk almost come out of his nose.

"Oh, honestly, Harry! Get over it. Ron and I are together. When are you going to get Ginny back?" Hermione says, placing a hand on her hip in a very Hermione-ish way.

Harry sighs, wishing he could have Ginny back. After breaking up with her last year because of the whole Voldemort thing, she moved on. It seems like him and Ginny had never happened.

"I don't think I want a relationship. I don't think a girl wants to always wonder when Voldemort is going to attack their boyfriend." He starts eating a couple strips of bacon that appeared in front of him.

"Yeah, that wouldn't be very good. What would you do if I had that problem, Hermione?" Ron says, his mouth a little full, which gets a disapproving look from Hermione.

"I don't know. I don't think I could live like that." She looks at Harry, who looks as if all hope is lost. "But, if I was really in love with the person I don't see why not?" Harry can tell this is just an attempt to make him feel better.

"Yeah, guess so." He looks around the lunchroom, sees Snape's empty spot, and then looks at the Slytherin table, and sees Malfoy's usual crew, Crabbe, Goyle, and Pansy all missing. He wonders if they're all working for Voldemort, or maybe even just Malfoy. Though, their new Headmistress, Professor McGonagall, interrupts his thoughts.

"Harry, may I speak to you for a second?" She grabs him by the arm and drags him into the hallway before he can answer. "I just wanted to say if you need to talk about anything that happened in the past year, then you can always come to me." Harry sighs and kind of zones out, having heard this speech multiple times from people over the summer, including Mr. And Mrs. Weasley, Hermione, Ron (who Harry was sure was put up to it by Hermione), and a couple other teachers. "You listening, Potter?"

"Huh? Yeah. What was that last thing you said?" He blushes a little as she gives him a disapproving look.

"Dumbledore left a couple of his things to you. I have to give you them on certain dates though, it says in his will. The first thing is a letter, but he left it somewhere outside of Hogwarts, and he asked me to have you find it. You'll have to wait until Christmas Break though, okay? It's only a week away, shouldn't cause too much of a trouble for you." Harry takes in all this information.

"Wait, Dumbledore left things to _me_? Why me? I'm just a student." Professor McGonagall shakes her head.

"Not to him, and not to a lot of people in the wizarding world, Harry. You are very important for the future of us all. For all of the magic and muggle world. Hopefully you'll realize this soon." Harry shrugs not possibly understanding how he can be, except for he's the only one who can supposedly destroy Voldemort, but he doubts that now that someone like Snape killed someone like Dumbledore.

"Alright. But can you tell me why I can't have the letter now?" Professor McGonagall studies him for a second and sighs.

"Can't. It's Dumbledore's wishes from me, and I do not wish to disobey them. You'll find out when the time is right, everything will fall into place. That's what he said." Harry sighs as the new Headmistress walks away.

"I wish I knew sooner rather than later." He shoves his hands in his pockets and walks back into the Great Hall, to join his friends why they finish up their breakfast.


	2. Hermione's Explanation

He sits back down, the talk Professor McGonagall just gave him still running through his mind, like its still happening. Hermione and Ron look at each other, then back at Harry.

"You okay, mate? You look kind of buggered." Harry looks at Ron and sighs.

"Yeah. Another, the whole future is up to me speech, and Dumbledore left me some things in his will." Hermione gets excited instantly.

"Really? Wow, Harry. What an honor! Dumbledore, probably one of the greatest wizards that had ever lived, has left you, as student, some of his personal belongings. I guess you were like a son to him, but really. This is amazing." Harry rolls his eyes.

"Yeah, the problem is, he's doing a scavenger hunt. I don't know if I can take this. We have N.E.W.T.S. this year and the Dark Lord is probably more powerful than ever, which means more trouble for me." Hermione stops Harry.

"Maybe that's what the things are about. Clues to how you can defeat Voldemort finally." Ron winces. "Oh, come now, Ron! Honestly! You'd think you'd be used to it by now." She turns back to Harry. "Did McGonagall tell you what the first thing was?"

Harry nods. "A letter. I don't know what it's about or anything. Just a letter. And I can't find it or where it is until Christmas break."

Hermione sighs. "There has to be good reason for this. Maybe he's testing your patience. You do need a little more of that." Harry starts to open his mouth to contest, but Ron finally breaks in, sensing an argument is about to start.

"Maybe we should just talk about this some other time. Classes are going to start in a bit, and we don't even have our books." Harry growls and replies.

"Fine, alright. Lets go." He gets up and hurries upstairs to get his things, Hermione and Ron following behind, hesitating to get too close to him.


	3. Seventeen, Slytherin, and Sexy

The letter has been on Harry's mind for a while now. Hermione and Ron, don't know why it bothers him so much. So it holds an important key to his future, what doesn't? They usually don't hang around Harry much these days, due to constant snapping and growing at everything they say, ask, or do. Harry finds himself walking the corridors alone.

"Why does Dumbledore always do this to me. Even after his death he plays these mind games with me." He sighs and looks at an open book in front of him, which someone had just abandoned. Something catches his eye…it's one of the dark corridors he saw in his dream. "No, there has to be a lot of dark corridors like that." He pulls the book towards him and flips it so it's facing him.

The picture in front of him is not of a corridor at all though. It's a picture of a dark line of trees that looks a lot like a corridor, and there's a light at the very end of it. He looks at it perplexed. The caption below the picture reads, _The Forest Of Shadows, a place to find what you need. _ Harry sighs.

"I wish there were a forest of shadows around here." He closes the book and pushes it away. He shuts his eyes for a bit, trying to clear his mind, when he hears someone sit in the chair in front of him. He opens his eyes and sees a girl with reddish brown hair and beautiful brown eyes that never seem to end. Her hair is pulled back into a pony tail, but she has two strands hanging by her face. Her black eyeliner makes it even easier to get lost in her eyes.

"Hey, you took my book! And lost what page it was on…thanks!" She says, opening her book and trying to find the page it was on. Harry keeps staring at her and she glances back up, catching him. "What are you staring at?" Harry realizes that he was staring and blushes.

"Er…nothing. I'm sorry." He looks away, then looks back. "I'm really sorry, I just saw something that looks familiar to me. The Forest Of Shadows?" This makes the girl look back up at Harry.

"The forest of shadows? You've been there?" She's suddenly more interested in Harry than the book.

"Yeah. Well, no…I mean, sort of? You know how you have a dream, but it's like you're actually there, but you're not?" The girl nods slightly as Harry continues on. "Well, that's how I've been there." A look of alarm is now on the girls face.

"Really, well, I've been having a dream like that too. That's why I got this book, because I've seen the forest of shadows before. My dad took me there. And I can't get it out of my mind." Harry is now interested in not only her looks, but what she knows about this forest of shadows.

"Really? Well, how recently has he taken you there?" The Girl Laughs.

"You mean how long ago. It's been at least," She pauses, thinking about how long ago it actually was, "ten years now? Yeah, when I was seven."

"So, you're in your seventh year?" Harry asks. Happy that he's met a beautiful, intelligent girl in his own year. He shakes his head. "I mean, what have your dreams been like?"

"Well," she says, trying to remember, "I'm running through the forest, and I can't ever get to the light, and then I finally get closer to a light, and there's a person there. But I can't tell who it is." Harry sits back in his chair, overwhelmed.

"That's my same exact dream." The girl looks at him and smiles.

"Wow. That's some kind of amazing, isn't it?" Harry nods.

"You're telling me. By the way, I'm Harry. Gryffindor." He holds out his hand and the girl grabs it and shakes.

"Sanura, Slytherin." Harry cocks his eyebrow.

"You're a Slytherin? How can you be so cool?" She laughs.

"I'm just lucky I guess. You said Harry right? What's your last name?" Harry tries to hide his scar, but sighs, knowing she'll see it sooner or later.

"Potter, Harry Potter." Sanura studies him for a second.

"You're not bad looking at all. Pansy was probably just siding with Draco. What an ass." Harry looks at this girl, this _Slytherin_ girl, a look of udder bewilderment on his face.

"You don't like Draco?"

"Am I the first not to?" She smiles. "Nice talking to you, Potter. Maybe I'll see you around." She gets up and leaves the table. Harry has forgotten all about the letter now.


End file.
